No One Has a Specific Clothing Size

Most people would agree that your clothing size depends on a variety of different factors, like brand, style and fabric. There's never one straight answer for the question, "What clothing size are you?" So I went shopping, purely in the name of ~fashion journalism.~

As part of the Parsons x Teen Vogue Fashion Industry Essentials program, I took a trip to an outlet mall to do some experimenting with fashion production. I tried on TONS of clothes in different stores and noticed that I was a different size at nearly each one — especially in jeans, where I ranged over five sizes in total. 

When I got to Express, one of my favorite stores, I knew I was going to buy a few items. I was a little upset when I saw that a shirt I fell in love with (light blue with lace cap sleeves!) was sold out in medium, my usual size. I ended up picking out a few other pieces and heading straight to the fitting room. Turns out that the three items I ended up buying were all different sizes. It's even crazier because they were small, medium and large, not even numbered sizes, where it usually seems like the differences are smaller. And that shirt I fell in love with? I ended up fitting in a large almost perfectly! 

But when I went to go try on that same shirt in black, I found that the large was way too big on me. I was basically drowning in fabric. Another black size large proved to be a bit smaller, but not quite the same as the blue one that fit me so well. 

This goes to prove that all clothing is not created equal. Sizes vary just as often within individual pieces as they do in different brands. Wouldn't life be so much easier if every store had the same sizing? I mean, we would still have to deal with the variations between individual items, but that's a lot easier to handle.